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“There’s no success without trust
in a working partnership.”
Evonik and the Leibniz Institute for
Catalysis (LIKAT) in Rostock (Germany)
have been working together for over a
decade. The cooperation with the
Performance Intermediates Business Line
in particular has produced numerous patents
and new catalysts. The new lab at
LIKAT cements Evonik’s commitment to
broadening the partnership, and Prof.
Matthias Beller, in charge of LIKAT, and
Prof. Stefan Buchholz, head of Innovation
Management at Evonik’s Advanced
Intermediates Business Unit, share their
thoughts on what this entails.
which areas will you be researching
together in the new lab?
Buchholz: The main joint research do -
main at the EVA, the Evonik Advanced
Catalysis Lab@LIKAT, centers on new
catalysts for manufacturing processes at
the Performance Intermediates Business
Line. The focus is on hydroformylation,
globally the most important homogenous
catalytic reaction to use organometallic
catalysts. More than ten million metric
tons of products, mostly plasticizer alco-
with it every year. With an annual production
capacity of just over 400,000
metric tons, Evonik is one of the leading
manufacturers of isononanol (INA) and
2-propylheptanol (2PH), which are used
mainly in making two types of plasticizers:
Diisononyl phthalate (DINP) and
di(2-propyl heptyl) phtha late (DPHP).
DINP and DPHP belong to the group of
high-molecular-weight phthalates, which
distinguish themselves through their
superior application engineering profile
and toxicological safety.
Beller: We also look forward to putting
the catalysis expertise gained over so
many years to work on carbonylations
and hydroformylations. One idea is to
functionalize renewable resources into
viable products for Evonik. We believe
that renewables will become increasingly
important in coming years. While this
opens up many new opportunities, it is
also an area that presents major challenges—and
they must be met. We intend
to venture into uncharted territory, too.
It’s a high-risk proposition from a re -
search standpoint, but it may well also
InteRVIeW
Prof. Matthias Beller (left), in charge of LIKAt,
and Prof. Stefan Buchholz, head of Innovation
Management at evonik’s Advanced Intermediates
Business Unit
what are the objectives?
Buchholz: The goal for Evonik is to
continue strengthening our leadership
position, especially in hydroformylation.
New catalyst systems, for instance,
would enable us to achieve both higher
yields as well as even higher selectivities
for target molecules.
Here, the key is to keep catalyst
costs under control. Hydroformylation
catalysts are often based on rhodium,
an extremely rare precious metal that’s
several times more expensive than gold.
Ligands, mostly organic phosphines or
phosphites, stabilize the rhodium catalysts,
which in turn helps minimize precious
metal loss. In addition, they also
have a decisive impact on catalyst activity
and selectivity. And because manufacturing
ligands is often a complex and
expensive process, we have to make
sure that the ligands we jointly develop
are also economically feasible in terms
of their production cost.
Another key aspect is that ligands have
to remain stable under extreme reaction
conditions, that is, high pressure and high
hols and surfactants, are manufactured yield significant economic rewards. temperature, and deliver the end-
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elements39 Issue 2|2012